The Shame Realization
by WeBuiltThePyramids
Summary: Set just after the fourth season finale.  Mentions of Penny/Leonard and Penny/Raj


**So I think that in terms of Penny and Leonard, they'd have gotten back together via Leonard and Priya breaking up. Now, even if they did break up, Leonard and Penny are set back again due to her hookup with Raj. Even if Leonard isn't mad, Penny is shamed. That's what this fic is about.**

**I haven't written in a while - I've been making vids (anything May 2011 and later - of course - are real vids and not slideshows, username the same on youtube as here) so I may be a little rusty. Forgive me! :)**

**DISCLAIMER: Believe me, I don't own it.**

She kept facing forward. She couldn't look at any of them. She heard Sheldon ask what she was talking about, what was everyone assuming, why was the room so shocked. She certainly didn't care to stop and explain that it looked like she and Raj put the speed of light squared on mass to make energy.

Penny stopped with a hand on her door knob. That made it sound sciency. She didn't want it to sound that way. That made it sound cool, and thinking that way didn't even shock Penny anymore.

She stared down at the door knob, not wanting to move now that she had stopped. But she knew they were behind her, probably watching, so she forced the door open and stormed inside, slamming it behind her. It was then that she was aloud to repeat what she'd only said twice in the bedroom that morning, her disgust evident to anyone who could have heard her.

"Oh _God_," she said putting her hands over her face. She could tell it was beat red by the heat that she felt from her palms. She knew what she had just done by coming over here, and she'd done it many times before, but this was the first time that she fully understood the name Walk of Shame.

Penny crossed the living room and sank down on the couch. Everyone. Everyone saw. They couldn't pretend it didn't happen. It would always have happened. Everyone saw. Leonard saw. He had a girlfriend, but he still knew. It happened. Everyone saw. Leonard saw.

"Oh _God_!" She said again, resting her forehead on the arm of the seat. Why was everyone there? Sheldon lived there, of course, and Raj technically did too, although she really didn't want him to after this, even more than she'd wanted him to leave before. Before she was just upset that Leonard was gone, living with Priya of his own choosing, not looking back to a lonely Nebraskan girl who'd had him and, in a moment fearing something that was never going to come to pass anyway, let him go.

Penny began to comfort herself with the thought that Leonard had a girlfriend. He probably didn't care what she was doing. Of course, he did try to go after her when she'd left him in the lobby, and Penny knew that it hurt him knowing that they couldn't be friends anymore. She, however, knew that she hurt worse, because friendship wasn't all she wanted from him. She wanted what Priya had, because she knew that she and Leonard had so much more together than he did with his current girlfriend. The girlfriend he was now living with, which made their little prolonged fling even better. Okay, maybe this was more than a fling – it had to be, or Penny wouldn't feel so threatened, so pathetic by comparison to the new woman, and so filled with regret that she'd admit her darkest secret to someone else.

_I screwed up. Leonard's a great guy. Should never have broken up with him._

Well, now she'd royally screwed up again.

Penny raised her head. If Leonard and Priya were living together, why was he crashed on the couch? Clearly he'd slept there, with the blanket pulled around him. Why Howard was there was irrelevant, although it probably had to do with his argument with Bernadette.

Bernadette. In cases like this Penny always thought she'd call her or Amy and they'd make her feel better. But they couldn't in this case. They'd probably just blab about what wasn't important, like her ex – boyfriend who she still loved witnessing the walk of shame because he was in the apartment instead of with his girlfriend…

She wasn't kidding herself. That's what bothered her the most, well, right behind actually having sex with Raj, who always felt like a little brother to her, despite his age. Of course Leonard would spend this night of all nights at his apartment. His old apartment. Whatever.

Why was he there?

Penny cocked her head, feeling excitement building inside of her ever so slightly. Did he and Priya fight? They'd fought before, but never had one of them stormed away in the middle of the night.

Were they broken up?

Oh God. Were they over?

Penny put a hand to her mouth. It would explain why he'd be there, yes, it would explain everything! "Oh God," she said, again, shaking slightly in happiness, in relief.

Then, suddenly, the excitement drained out of her body. "Oh…God…" she said again, slowly. She put her hands back up to her face.

If Leonard and Priya had indeed broken up, then he was available again. She'd been waiting for his moment for months. And now…just when under ordinary circumstances she'd have her chance, that precious second chance she'd been longing for, he'd witnessed her Walk of Shame – indeed – with one of his best friends.

Penny pressed her lips together and squeezed her eyes shut. It didn't work. Seconds later she broke, sobbing into her hands, her body shaking again, violently, in grief and regret.


End file.
